


Cosmic Lies

by Johnny_Law



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-17
Updated: 2016-07-17
Packaged: 2018-07-24 12:40:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,681
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7508665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Johnny_Law/pseuds/Johnny_Law
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The universe is a pretty empty place, or so Lance thinks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Cosmic Lies

The thing about space is, there’s a lot of it and not much else.

Lance looked out at the big empty, the long void of nothing punctuated with the silver pin points of distant stars, wondering which of those might be the sun of Earth. It was a constant dull ache in the back of his mind, a bruise that never quite went away. Earth, his home, his family, they were out there some where. Did they know he was alive, or had there been a cover up like the Cerberus mission? Had a man and woman come around in formal military dress, carrying a letter of condolence for his parents. Had there been a funeral with a flag draped over an empty coffin?

These were the thoughts that went through his mind when he was alone, staring out into the nothingness of the universe. The universe he was meant to protect, possibly meant to die for, countless light-years away from home. His mom and dad might never know how he died, or why.

Maybe he wouldn’t feel this grip of anxiety, this nasty little bug drilling into the back of his head, if the universe didn’t feel so empty and alone. So full of nothing at all.

He put a hand to the glass that protected them from the howling suck of space. He’d almost been dragged out into the black once already, to suffocate and be pulverised, lungs collapsed in on themselves. Galaxy Garrison had drilled them on the dangers of space exposure in gory detail, made them study the case file on the deaths of those Russian cosmonauts back in the nineteen-seventies.

The only good thing about it was it was meant to be fast, you were knocked out in fourteen seconds then dead in under a minute. Which, in Lance’s opinion, was a pretty strange definition of ‘good’. For the longest time Lance had thought it was the worst danger space had to offer and the worst fate a pilot could suffer. Now he wasn’t so sure.

He turned away from the glass, turned his somber expression into a casual grin, adjusting the collar of his hoodie. Space was dangerous, sure, but there were benefits. He was a paladin of Voltron, one of only five space knights sworn to protect the universe. Sworn to protect an alluring alien princess named Allura. Now that made it pretty worth while, because she sure was worth protecting. What red blooded guy wouldn’t want to protect a beautiful girl like that?

Sure she didn’t seem to need much protecting, but it was the idea of protecting her, that was the point.

He thought all this as he walked back to his quarters. He was a paladin of Voltron, a sworn defender of the universe, pilot of the blue lion, a space knight sworn to protect a beautiful princess. He drilled it over and over until his walk turned into a swagger and the cocky grin felt real.

‘I’m Lance, paladin of Voltron, pilot of the blue lion, defender of the universe.’

It was a nice thought.

It was a nice thought that went right out of his head when he turned a corner and nearly tripped over Pidge coming the other way. She bounced off his stomach with a surprised grunt. Instinctively he reached out to grab her, keep her from falling over, but even before his hands were steadying her she was pushing him off.

“Great, the very last person I wanted to see. I swear as empty as this place is, you’re the only one who can still get in people’s way,” she said, stepping away from him. Her eyes were down, and her usually jibe came out hollow, lacking her usual bite. Her glasses had come loose and she adjusted them with a deep set frown.

“Well a good morning to you too short-stop,” he said, “Sorry if I didn’t see you down there.”

She brushed back her messy hair. “Whatever, just be more careful next time,” she started past him.

Were her cheeks wet?

“You okay Pidge?” Lance asked, and maybe it was the tone of his voice made her stop. He had to admit, it sounded strange even to himself, strangled almost.

She looked back at him, her expression churned up, eyes gleaming. “What do you care?” she said, walking backwards a step, “Look at you, strutting around like nothing matters. This is all just a big game to you.” There was more of the bite she’d been missing before, but harder than he’d ever heard it.

Anger lit up Lance’s chest. “Oh I’m sorry, did my good mood interrupt your brood session?” he put a hand against the wall, suddenly so angry that his shoulders shook, “You think just because I don’t mope all the time I don’t care about anything. Well guess what Katie, we’ve all got families we're worried about.” He used her real name like a slap and he felt a squirm of shame in his gut when her eyes widened behind her glasses and her face went pale.

She turned away from him, running. “Pidge, Pidge wait!” he called after her, started after her down the corridor.

He turned the corner to find her standing in front of the glass, pressed to it, the universe looking in on them with a cold impassivity. She was shaking. He must have really struck a nerve.

“Pidge,” he stepped closer, “Look, I’m sorry. That was a real jerk thing to say. I’m a real jerk, y’know? I say dumb stuff.”

She looked over her shoulder at him, tears running down her face, nose red. “It’s not about you,” she said.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, coming up behind her.

She turned around, her back pressed to the glass, couldn’t even look at him as tears ran down her face, instead she stared up at the ceiling. “I’m an awful person,” she said.

“That is the least true thing you’ve ever said,” Lance replied, coming a little closer.

“I ran away to find my family and I didn’t stop to think, didn’t stop to think even once what I was leaving behind,” she sniffed, “I abandoned her, my mom. She’s all alone back on Earth. She probably thinks I’m already dead, just like Dad and Matt. She thinks we’re all gone. What if I do die out here, what does that leave her with? How could I do that to her?”

“Easy, easy,” he took her shoulders, voice soft, making noises like she was a startled horse. “It’s not your fault.”

“It is my fault, it is entirely my fault,” her hands came up to his chest like she was going to push him away, but instead they scrunched up in his shirt, clinging to him. His heart gave a strong, sudden thump. His chest went hot, uncomfortable, buzzing like a swarm of bees. He held her a little closer.

“It’s all an act y’know,” he said. She looked up at him, frowning through her tears. He looked back to the yawning enormity of outer-space. “I play it up, the hot shot pilot thing. Truth is, I’m scared all the time. Scared of dying, scared of letting everyone else down, scared of…everything. It’s like a con I’m running against myself." 

“Lance,” she said, but he couldn’t stop, it was like he was unstrapping a heavy weight and it came crashing down around him.

“I’m just trying to convince myself I’m this great thing, that if I keep repeating the lie enough times, that maybe it’ll be true. That I am a great pilot, that nothing will get to me, but you can’t hold onto a lie out here, not while looking out at that. It’s too empty for lies, it sucks them up like it does everything else. Look at it.”

She turned her head to look where he was looking, out into the depths of space, the long void of nothing that separated them by the stretch of billions of years from their families. So impossibly bare, cold and full of nothing. The empty cosmos stretched on, silent and grim, hitting him like an existential hammer.

There was a glimmer in the distance. It started small but grew quickly. Ropes of light stretched out like the tentacles of an enormous beast, in reds, oranges, purples and whites, every colour across the spectrum. It tightened Lance’s throat and stopped his heart in his chest. A burst of light flooding out, washing against the glass screen, running across the castle. A brilliant super nova that rushed over them, that blanked out the darkness of space and for a moment at least turned it into a weaving, living pattern of colour.

“Beautiful,” Pidge’s voice. His gaze went down to her, she still held him by the shirt, pressed close to him. Her face was lit by the alien light burst, reflected across her cheeks, the lens of her glasses. The tears had dried, her eyes were wide with awe.

“Beautiful, yeah,” he said, a pleasant warmth running through him.

The light faded out into hot bright spots of white which soon faded too, leaving only spots across his vision. With a blink the universe returned to its deep uniform blackness. Lance put a hand to her cheek, turned her face up to his. She looked up, cheeks red.

“We’ll get home,” he said, “We’ll get home to our families, and everything will be alright. You’ll get your dad and brother back to your mom, and it’ll all be happy tears all around. We’ll live, Pidge, and we’ll win. And we’ll tell stories about this whole adventure when we’re old, and we'll laugh at how scared we were. How we were the paladins of Voltron, protecting the universe from evil.”

“Will we?” she asked, her head bowed against his chest, her hands sliding to his back.

“Yeah,” he said, his hand disappearing into her hair, “We will.” And if he told himself that enough, he thought as he held her tight, maybe he’d start to believe it too.


End file.
